Frank (my husband) and I may need to sub-let our Chelsea ground floor flat temporarily due to a new job. We used a Chelsea conveyancing firm in 2004 but they have closed and we did not have the foresight to seek any advice as to whether the lease permits subletting. How do we find out?

Notwithstanding that your previous Chelsea conveyancing lawyer is not around you can review your lease to see if you are permitted to let out the premises. The rule is that if the deeds are non-specific, subletting is allowed. Quite often there is a prerequisite that you must seek permission via your landlord or some other party before subletting. The net result is you not allowed to sublet in the absence of first obtaining consent. The consent must not not be unreasonably refused ore delayed. If the lease does not allow you to sublet you should ask your landlord for their consent.

I only have 62 years left on my lease in Chelsea. I now wish to extend my lease but my freeholder is can not be found. What should I do?

If you meet the appropriate requirements, under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 you can submit an application to the County Court for for permission to dispense with the service of the initial notice. This will enable the lease to be extended by the magistrate. However, you will be required to prove that you have done all that could be expected to track down the landlord. In some cases an enquiry agent should be useful to conduct investigations and to produce an expert document to be accepted by the court as evidence that the freeholder is indeed missing. It is wise to seek advice from a solicitor in relation to investigating the landlord’s absence and the application to the County Court covering Chelsea.

I’m about to sell my garden apartment in Chelsea.Conveyancing lawyers have not yet been instructed but I have just received a half-yearly maintenance charge invoice – what should I do?

Your conveyancing lawyer is likely to suggest that you should discharge the invoice as normal because all ground rent and service charges will be apportioned on completion, so you will be reimbursed by the buyer for the period running from after the completion date to the next payment date. Most management companies will not acknowledge the buyer unless the service charges have been paid and are up to date so it is important for both buyer and seller for the seller to show that they are up to date. Having a clear account will assist your cause and will leave you no worse off financially.

Can you provide any advice for leasehold conveyancing in Chelsea with the intention of expediting the sale process?

• A significant proportion of the delay in leasehold conveyancing in Chelsea can be reduced where you appoint lawyers as soon as your agents start marketing the property and ask them to put together the leasehold information which will be required by the buyers conveyancers.
• In the event that you altered the property did you need the Landlord’s consent? Have you, for example laid down wooden flooring? Most leases in Chelsea state that internal structural changes or installing wooden flooring calls for a licence from the Landlord acquiescing to such alterations. If you dont have the consents in place do not contact the landlord without contacting your lawyer first.
• If there is a history of conflict with your landlord or managing agents it is essential that these are resolved before the property is marketed. The buyers and their solicitors will be nervous about purchasing a flat where there is an ongoing dispute. You may have to bite the bullet and pay any arrears of service charge or resolve the dispute prior to completion of the sale. It is therefore preferable to have any dispute settled ahead of the contract papers being issued to the buyers’ solicitors. You will still have to reveal particulars of the dispute to the buyers, but it is clearly preferable to reveal the dispute as historic rather than unsettled.
• If you are supposed to have a share in the freehold, you should make sure that you are holding the original share document. Arranging a duplicate share certificate can be a lengthy process and delays many a Chelsea home move. Where a duplicate share is required, do contact the company officers or managing agents (where relevant) for this at the earliest opportunity.
• You may think that you are aware of the number of years remaining on your lease but you should double-check via your lawyers. A purchaser's conveyancer will not be happy to advise their client to proceed with the purchase of a leasehold property the lease term is below 75 years. It is therefore essential at an early stage that you identify whether the lease term for your property needs extending. If it does, contact your solicitors before you put your premises on the market for sale.

Our conveyancer has advised that he intends to complete and exchange simultaneously on the sale of our £ 200000 garden flat in Chelsea in just under a week. The landlords agents has quoted £<Macro 'feeRangeWithVAT'> for Landlord’s certificate, insurance certificate and previous years statements of service charge. Is the landlord entitled to charge exorbitant fees for a leasehold conveyance in Chelsea?

For most leasehold sales in Chelsea conveyancing will involve, questions about the management of a building inevitably needing to be answered directly by the freeholder or its agent, this includes :

• Answering pre-contract enquiries
• Where consent is required before sale in Chelsea
• Copies of the building insurance and schedule
• Deeds of covenant upon sale
• Registering of the assignment of the change of lessee after a sale

Your solicitor will have no control over the level of the charges for this information but the average costs for the information for Chelsea leasehold property is £350. For Chelsea conveyancing transactions it is customary for the seller to pay for these costs. The landlord or their agents are under no legal obligation to answer such questions most will be willing to do so - albeit often at exorbitant prices where the fees bear little relation to the work involved. Unfortunately there is no law that requires fixed charges for administrative tasks. Neither is there any legal time frame by which they are required to supply answers.

Having spent years of correspondence we simply can't agree with our landlord on how much the lease extension should cost for our flat in Chelsea. Can we issue an application to the Residential Property Tribunal Service?

You certainly can. We are happy to put you in touch with a Chelsea conveyancing firm who can help.

An example of a Lease Extension case for a Chelsea residence is 150A Albert Palace Mansions Lurline Gardens in July 2013. The Tribunal determined that the premium payable for the new lease of the subject property was £42,069 This case was in relation to 1 flat. The unexpired lease term was 57.06 years.

I bought a leasehold flat in Chelsea, conveyancing was carried out 9 years ago. Can you please calculate a probable premium for a statutory lease extension? Equivalent flats in Chelsea with over 90 years remaining are worth £198,000. The ground rent is £65 charged once a year. The lease runs out on 21st October 2089

With 63 years remaining on your lease we estimate the price of your lease extension to range between £20,000 and £23,000 plus costs.

The figure above a general guide to costs for renewing a lease, but we are not able to provide the actual costs without more detailed investigations. Do not use this information in a Notice of Claim or as an informal offer. There are no doubt other issues that need to be taken into account and clearly you want to be as accurate as possible in your negotiations. Neither should you take any other action based on this information without first getting professional advice.